It’s the beginning of October. Horror month. The month when all the little ghoulies and ghosties wobble about, when all the movie blogs get clogged with terror, like the bulging, diseased arteries of a dying heart-attack victim, with a rictus grin on his face and a look of terrible knowledge in his eyes.
Last year, I did a thing all month on vampires, like a post on them every day, and although you might think that I would do something like that again, I won’t. It was a major pain in my bleeding, rat-infested … basement … and I just don’t have the energy. Besides, I don’t really know all that much about horror.
BUT some people I know do, and I direct your kind attention to them:
- Count Gregula, over at Cinema Styles, is doing all horror, all month, and last week he had a tasty post on that ol’ bloodsucker himself, the man who put the bite back in … well, bite: Dracula. And today there’s a fine piece on John Carpenter’s Christine. Get over there and let him know how you feel about his efforts.
- Bill is doing a series where he reads horror books and tells us what he thinks. Bill knows a lot about horror, he even writes some of it himself, and his posts are always great. I learn a lot when he does the series thing.
- Arbogast almost doesn’t count, because his blog is always about horror. But, last year he pumped up the volume come October with “31 Screams,” and it’s back this year. Today’s post on King Kong is especially fine. You really should check it out.
- Fox, at Tractor Facts, has been blogging about the 2009 Fantastic Fest, writing small, concise pieces on the movies he’s seen. Even though it ended on October 1, before the seasonal festivities really get started, it makes a great warm up.
- Here are a few random, Halloweeny-links
- FilmDr has a review of the fabulous new zombie movie Zombieland; look for my take on it in a day or two.
- Halloween.com, from the folks who brought you Thanksgiving.info, SantaClaus.com and my favorite, PhoneBook.com. Sister site: Halloween.biz
- Guglielmo Anthony’s review of Chan-Wook Park’s Thirst, in Films in Review
- Frankensteinia is all Frankenstein, all the time.
There’ll also be some Halloween-type posts around here, as well. Happy October!
Update: Peter Nellhaus, Asian film expert extraordinaire, will be covering Asian horror all month. It’s common knowledge that some of the best recent horror is from that neck of the woods.
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Thanks for the link! I look forward to your review of Zombieland.
I was wondering when I was going to see an October post from you. And now that I’ve read it I guess I won’t be seeing much more. Well, I know how you feel. I simply can’t let an October go by without celebrating it but no more “31 days” nonsense for me. I gave up on weekends a long time ago. You get very little traffic and… it’s the weekend. Time for other things. The only weekend post I’ll do this October will be the last day since it falls on a Saturday, but that’s it.
Clearly, my weekends mean nothing to me. Or, I don’t ever go out. Either way, it’s 31 days again for me, baby. Maybe I should at least go easy, except the way I have my posts mapped out, short-term, is that I should have a post that I will at least care if people read or not on Saturday. So that was badly planned.
Thanks for the link, though, Rick!
FilmDr — You’re welcome. I liked the flick, and will post on it tomorrow or the next day.
Greg, I’ll probably post several more October posts … as you’ve noticed and we’ve discussed, my general posting energy is at a minimum now, I’m going to just post what I can and hope to get back to my former four or five posts a week eventually.
To show how unmotivated I am at the moment to blog, the post above — which should have been a knock-off — had been sitting incomplete on my queue since last Friday.
Bill — as a preacher, I’ve got Fridays off. So I often get a post done on Friday and it either gets posted late Friday or on Saturday, but I generally try to avoid weekend posting for the same reason as Greg.
I didn’t bother to make a formal announcement, but I’ll be covering Asian horror films, mostly from Thailand, Korea, Hong Kong and the Philippines.
Peter — Sorry I missed it. I’ve added it to the post, and am looking forward to them.
Thanks for the mention. I don’t think of myself as an expert though. Just someone who spends more time with films from that part of the globe.
I’m going to tell Arbo that you said he doesn’t count. Watch out for flying axes!
The pressure is on, Rick – you need to convince me that I should see Zombieland. And you know by now that horror/zom-coms are not my preferred genres.
Though I have read elsewhere that Zombieland references Anaconda, and any movie that references one of my favorite b-movies is probably worth seeing out of respect alone.
Peter — you’re closest thing to an expert I regularly read.
Arbo, of course, heh, heh, I was only kidding. Really. I have nothing but the highest affection for you and your marvelous blog. You should hear what Marilyn says about you.
Daniel, this might not classify as convincing you to watch it, but it’s a pretty straightforward, post-modern zombie flick. The jokes and the gore just keep on coming, and it’s plot can be summed up in two words “keep running”
I actually don’t count. I guesstimate. Works for me.
Actually, Arbo, I don’t guesstimate, I assume. And you know what happens when you do that.